Visual Studio 2017 & 2019 do not start but with no errors

Question

On my Windows 10 Pro desktop machine both Visual Studio Community 2017 & 2019 do not start at all but no errors are shown when I create a log file.

Starting them with the switch /SafeMode did not help either.

I have tried repairing the installation, uninstalling them and installing them again with my Antivirus disabled but to no avail.

Please help, Visual Studio is absolutely necessary for me as a .NET developer and I don't want to go back to Visual Studio 2010.

@magicandre1981 No, no events are generated when I try to launch the application. — Stavros Skamagkis, Nov 28 '20 at 16:20
run [processmonitor](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/procmon) while trying to start VS2019 and look what devenv.exe does — magicandre1981, Nov 28 '20 at 20:49
@magicandre1981 I see "NAME NOT FOUND" trying to open a few files but I'm not sure if these files are necessary for the program to work or should even exist, eg devenv.exe.local. — Stavros Skamagkis, Nov 29 '20 at 01:37
exe.local is related to [Dynamic-Link Library Redirection](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/dlls/dynamic-link-library-redirection) so this is not the cause — magicandre1981, Nov 29 '20 at 13:45
@magicandre1981 I see "NAME NOT FOUND" for IDE/VERSION.dll and devenv.rootsuffix. All other file operations are successful. — Stavros Skamagkis, Nov 30 '20 at 17:14
I since tried to boot with the non-ms services & startup programs disabled but with no success. However in Windows Safe Mode the program tried to start (it showed the splash screen). So a driver, program or system file might be conflicting. — Stavros Skamagkis, Nov 30 '20 at 17:17
But I have no idea which one yet and I don't know how to find out since the logs are not helpful. — Stavros Skamagkis, Nov 30 '20 at 17:18
check disk for errors and also run sfc and DISM to repair corrupted files — magicandre1981, Nov 30 '20 at 17:20
run devenv.exe from inside Windbg.exe and run **!analyze -v** for all exceptions you see, maybe you find the one which prevents you from opening VS — magicandre1981, Nov 30 '20 at 18:18
@magicandre1981 Thank you, I'll have to check how this tool works and get back to you with my findings. — Stavros Skamagkis, Nov 30 '20 at 20:27
Install Win10 SDK, open windbg, [setup symbols](https://stackoverflow.com/a/30019890/1466046), select to run program (here select devenv.exe) ad press F5 until execution stops with exception, here run analyze command — magicandre1981, Nov 30 '20 at 20:41
@magicandre1981 The analysis references NTDLL. STACK_COMMAND: dt ntdll!LdrpLastDllInitializer BaseDllName ; dt ntdll!LdrpFailureData ; ~0s ; .cxr ; kb — Stavros Skamagkis, Dec 01 '20 at 09:47
at this point run ** ~0s ; .cxr ; kb** and look at the callstack — magicandre1981, Dec 01 '20 at 13:28
@magicandre1981 The last object in the call stack is ntdll!LdrInitializeThunk+0xe — Stavros Skamagkis, Dec 01 '20 at 15:26
[here is what the function does](https://stackoverflow.com/q/43851743/1466046), so DLL loading. issue. Use [pde.dll](https://onedrive.live.com/?authkey=%21AJeSzeiu8SQ7T4w&id=DAE128BD454CF957%217152&cid=DAE128BD454CF957) (copy to winext folder) and run **!pde.dpx -da** **!pde.dpx -du** to list all strings (unicode/ascii) maybe you see a DLL that cause the trouble. — magicandre1981, Dec 01 '20 at 17:26
@magicandre1981 PDE says that " "!pde.dpx" is not a valid address (0000000000000000)- aborting" — Stavros Skamagkis, Dec 02 '20 at 07:01
I run out of ideas how to debug this. try to [repair Windows](https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/16397-repair-install-windows-10-place-upgrade.html) and repair Visual Studio — magicandre1981, Dec 02 '20 at 11:36

Visual Studio 2017 & 2019 do not start but with no errors

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